Responses

Hi ispep. First, I would like to agree with you on your point of how during Bill Clinton’s administration regulations were lifted on the financial system that not only made lending less strict but also lifted other restrictions.

However, I disagree with you on your point that Barney Frank and/or Chris Dodd were the key players in lifting the major of the regulation on the financial system.

In the two, critically acclaimed and highly regarded, documentaries I listed below the primary people responsible for lifting regulation were Alan Greenspan, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve (1987-2006), Larry Summers, Secretary of Treasury (1999-2001), Henry Paulson, Secretary of Treasury (2006-2009), and a few others. But none have ties to either party.

Additionally it wasn’t just loose lending rules that lead to the collapse, but deregulation on a variety of financial issues such as, the Commodity Futures Modernization Act which banned the regulation of derivatives. A derivative is extremely difficult to explain in just a few sentences but just basically think of it a riskier gamble in banking.

Henry Paulson was the chief lobbyist that convinced the Federal Securities and Exchange Commission to relax and allow major investment banks to drastically increase their borrowing of money in 2004, NOT Barney Frank or Chris Dodd.

Now you may be wondering why these supposedly really intelligent people who have been a part of BOTH Republicans’ and Democrats’ administrations would want to deregulate the financial industry, and the answer to that is simply greed and corruption.

Larry Summers made 20 million dollars as a consultant to a hedge fund that relied heavily on derivatives.

Henry Paulson was previously the CEO of Goldman Sachs, the investment banking institution, and lobbied in their interests before and after he became the Secretary of Treasury.

Frederic Mishkin, Governor of the Federal Reserve (2006-2008), authored a study that said regulation was not needed in the financial sector, he forgot to mention in that paper that he was paid 124,000 dollars by the financial sector to write it.

In conclusion the recession we find ourselves in today cannot be blamed on either party. Because they both had little to do with it. It was fundamentally a caused by corruption generated from Wall Street greed.

P.S. I very highly recommend that you watch the documentary “Inside Job” by Charles Ferguson. His documentary has interviews from very highly regarded people in the financial industry, and in my opinion is unbiased as a fair documentary can be. Sorry for making this so long but there’s quite a lot to explain and I actually left out a whole bunch of info.

Sincerely,
Mr.Bogard

Source(s):

“Inside the Meltdown” Frontline PBS

“Inside Job” by director Charles Ferguson, (the film won the 2011 Academy Award for “Best Documentary”)

Source(s):

One more thing to add, Frank is a flat out liar. Why would he want to be responsible for the greatest finical collapse in US History? He said in his own words in 2005 that his committee will do their best to push the purchasing of homes... getting people to purchase a home knowing they can't make a payment. Crazy.

Source(s):

If you ask me I'd say both side are equally guilty because while they debate wallstreet gets rich and on what is Argument and most recessions started on was the housing bubble but let's talk about this bubbles in general there gave Ben hundreds through out history and the product changes but the story is the same so why does it keep happening the answer pure and simple greed every one wants in on a big thing that will make it rich so much so they begin to ignore the simpiliest law of capitalism which is get what you Pay for in Other words don't spend more money then what is worth. they continue to buy into something even when there's nothing solid behind them ( a fault of
The regulatory commission ) but nobody cares what there investing in as long as they get rich they don't care the sad thing we wind up bailing out the very institutions that bought into it

How were the bailouts a fail? Without them millions of Americans working in the auto industry would have lost their jobs. Some of America's largest companies would have gone bankrupt. As soon as the bailouts were released the auto industry started reporting profits.

Also Obama did not make the economy worse, he was just given a bad economy by Bush. Bush added 6.1 trillion dollars to our deficit, while Obama only added 2.4 trillion. Obama increased spending and because of that the American economy is increasing 3% a year. European countries cut spending and the EU's economy is declining 0.8% a year. Obama also decreased the unemployment rate and added millions of jobs in the private sector.

But putting my political views aside I think we should stop blaming our president and start blaming who really is at fault. The members of congress who are unwilling to compromise and just vote down anything their party leader tells them to. Because of them nothing happens and our economy is coming out of this recession very very slowly.

I find it absolutely HILARIOUS how republicans think that they are able to blame the poor economy on Democrats and/or Obama. How ignorant can you be?

First of all, the OP says "now we are in more of a deficit than ever before." Yes, yes we are. And do you know who's at fault, the Cheney Government (sometimes referred to as the Bush Government). Before they took power, we had a massive budget surplus. But after two simultaneous wars were fought while simultaneous huge tax breaks were made, our budget plunged into a deep deficit. Long before 2008.

Next, we must consider the fact that the economy collapsed several months before the 2008 election! All those years leading up to September of 2008 led up to this huge recession started before Obama was even elected. And General Motors received a huge bridge loan (pretty much a massive bailout) by the Bush Government in 2008!

Normally, I'm not one to throw around blame when it comes to politics, but in this case, the primary party at blame is clearly the republicans. It baffles me how republicans are able to turn it around on the democrats, and actually believe what they are claiming!

1. That was not a contradiction. Those two comments go together hand-in-hand. I'm not one to put blame on parties, but when it comes to this issue, the Bush Government is clearly to blame. Simple.

2. Half of your argument against what I said, ISN'T EVEN WHAT I SAID! You have zes808 to thank for that.

3. And to claim that liberals are misinformed? I think the true problem here is that conservative are over-informed by propaganda and over-patriotism to their party. I have yet to meet a republican that admits to any faults their party has ever committed. How about you live up to your mistakes for once, yes? This economic crisis, being one of them.

Do you even know what conservatism is? Do you even know what trickle down economics is? You're credibility is at an all time low, you are so uneducated on how economics work. You blame the republicans, the conservatives, for a problem that is CLEARLY a liberal/democratic issue.

How can you even say the Conservatives did this? You mean the ones who want to get out of debt, reduce spending, and make companies accountable are the ones that caused this issue?

Must we not forget you have yet to comment on Dodd Frank.

Keep blaming everything on Bush. Because we all know Clinton and Carter were just so great.... oh but they weren't. One of the worst presidencies for getting anything done was the one termer Carter, and the other was IMPEACHED. Now you have precision OBAMA who can't do anything right and has only hurt our country not to mention stunt our entire economy by just being in office.

You are so thick-skulled. It's like everything I'm saying is just bouncing off of your face, and you're just re-wording the invalid arguments you have already used several times throughout this post. It's rather pointless replying, to be honest.

The only thing that really gets my goat is how you say that it's the conservatives who want to correct this all and punish the ones who put us in this mess. It's an indisputable FACT that before Bush, we had a budget surplus, and after, a major deficit. I mean, that's only touching upon the surface of this issue, but that is clear evidence of a fault on the Bush Administration.

And by the way, I'm not technically blaming everything on Bush. I'm blaming it on Cheney; the puppet-master.

"I'm not technically blaming everything on Bush. I'm blaming it on Cheney; the puppet-master."

Great conspiracy theory. That explains a lot actually.

"You are so thick-skulled"

Thanks for the personal attack.

"It's rather pointless replying, to be honest."

It's because I've proved you wrong. Like the title of my post, it's funny how apparent it is you lost this debate. Still have yet to comment on Dodd Frank.

"It's an indisputable FACT that before Bush, we had a budget surplus, and after, a major deficit."

1. Since 1970 we've been in surplus for 4 years. Not a very valid point, nor does it show that republicans are at fault.
2. And the current Democrat is doing better? Look at Obama. Doubled that baby!
3. Do you know who Paul Ryan is?

By the very definition of 'conspiracy theory,' this one is not. it is, however, a personal opinion that I, perhaps, shouldn't have sneaked into my argument. This doesn't affect the validity of my argument, though.

It's not an attack, necessarily; it's a suggestion for improvement. How about you actually listen to my arguments instead of... well, I won't restate what I said earlier on.

And, in fact, it is rather pointless because: "It's like everything I'm saying is just bouncing off of your face, and you're just re-wording the invalid arguments you have already used several times throughout this post." You are just taking everything out of context, assuming that each of my sentences are unrelated. I gave reasoning as to why this is pointless.

Next, you haven't responded to every point I made, so why should I? Is this a crime?

And of course it shows republicans are at fault! It's not a matter of whether we were in a budget surplus in the past... No! When Bush came in, there was a budget surplus. When he came out, a massive deficit. Money, then no money. How simply must I put these terms for you?

Obama doubled it because the recession was uncontrollable. It was an uncontrollable downfall in the economy that cannot simply be halted with the snap of one's fingers. With an understanding of economics, as I'm sure you have, it is known that an economy naturally falls for several years until it begins its climb back up.

And yes, I know of Paul Ryan. And I wish he didn't exist. He is on his way to ruining this country. He has one objective in mind, and he's willing to jeopardize necessary fundamentals of legislative framework to achieve it.

I'm done with this, because you are providing me no credible points. In fact, you are barely making any points at all. This debate has turned into a liberal argument vs. an anti-liberal argument, whereas it should be liberal vs. conservative.

Not only was that one of the worst counters I've ever had on this site, but it was funny too as you still have yet to comment on the liberals known as Dodd/Frank.

Still, you blame the Republicans and Bush. Typical, since you and your liberal thoughts can't be accountable for the mess YOU created. Instead of fixing the problem and helping business/getting people back to work, you instead entitled them and redistributed the wealth. Then as that obviously doesn't work, you just go back to blaming Bush.

You crashed the housing industry, made your liberal backed unions produce crap cars and forced the companies to cut corners so they can still make a profit, and you put so many regulations on businesses it's impossible for them to grow. Congratulations. But wait... those are all things the liberals did isn't it?

The Vultren house is doing very well. Probably better than yours. We know how money works, and we are successful because of it. Thank you!